(UPDATE) “Tucker” has been adopted! (View Video Here)

July 23, 2019
By: Dwayne Page

(UPDATE)! Tucker has been adopted!

Who could resist a sweet little cuddle bug like “Tucker”?

This 9 week old Labrador/Boxer mix is the WJLE/DeKalb Animal Coalition featured “Pet of the Week”.

“Tucker is the last of a litter of five. All of his brothers and sisters have been adopted and he is waiting for that perfect place to call home. He doesn’t mind just hanging out with you.

The shelter is now open for business Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday from 12pm-4pm and Saturday 10am-12pm. and has a new telephone number 615-597-3647 (DOGS).

Located at 186 Transfer Station Road behind Tenneco Automotive.

July 23, 2019
By: Dwayne Page

A man accused of downloading child pornography onto his laptop computer two years ago has been sentenced in DeKalb County Criminal Court.

39 year old Winston Puckett entered a plea Monday to one count of sexual exploitation of a minor (over 50 images) and one count of aggravated sexual exploitation of a minor (less than 25 images). He received a 6 year sentence in one case and 4 years in the other to run consecutively for a total of 10 years and he must serve at least 30% of the term before he is eligible for parole. However, Puckett has already been in jail for 739 days and will be given credit for that time.

Sheriff Patrick Ray said that on Thursday, July 13, 2017 a search warrant was executed by a DeKalb County Sheriff’s Department Detective on a Dell laptop computer belonging to Puckett. The computer was in Puckett’s possession on June 27, 2017 when it was turned over to law enforcement. The search warrant revealed over 400 images of child pornography that had been downloaded to the computer.

July 23, 2019
By: Dwayne Page

After touring the sheriff’s department and jail Monday, members of the DeKalb County Grand Jury issued a statement on “a lack of correctional officer to prisoner ratio” there.

Grand Jury Report (pdf)

The Grand Jury’s report states that” the DeKalb County Grand Jury met on July 22, 2019. We toured the jail and found it satisfactory other than lack of correctional officer to prisoner ratio. The sheriff has asked for additional funds to hire needed help but was denied.”

On an unrelated matter, the Grand Jury stated that “ DeKalb County Clerk Jimmy Poss came and discussed county surety bonds with us. We heard from various law enforcement agencies regarding different criminal issues,” the report concluded.

During a budget committee meeting of the county commission in March, Sheriff Patrick Ray asked that funds be included in the new budget (2019-20) for five new positions including one extra court officer, two extra shift supervisor positions for the sheriff’s department operation, and two extra shift supervisors for the jail. That proposal was later determined to be too costly and the committee voted 3 to 2 to reject it.

In May, the budget committee reached a compromise with the sheriff in providing more manpower to meet the demands of courtroom security and other needs

The committee voted to fund in the 2019-20 budget two new officer positions solely from a proposed new litigation tax through the General Sessions Court budget. One other new deputy position will be created and funded by the county through the sheriff’s department budget. And while no new positions will be added to the jail budget, the sheriff plans to promote two existing correctional officers to the rank of corporal as jail supervisors. Each one will get a $2,000 increase in pay under the existing wage scale for sheriff’s department employees for a total of $4,000. The move keeps the sheriff’s department compliant with standards for around the clock jail supervision under standards of the Tennessee Corrections Institute.

The county commission Monday night adopted the new 2019-20 consolidated budget for all county departments and a 29 cent property tax increase to help fund it.

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